Linger
by witchyjuju
Summary: This is a one-shot that I wrote on Tumblr via one of my roleplay accounts and I was urged to continue it. Damon and Bonnie have both managed to make their way back home in one piece, though Bonnie's stay was slightly longer than Damon's. Now that they're back, life as they know it seems to have melted away. They find their thoughts beginning to linger on the other.
1. Chapter 1

Icy blue eyes were wide open, staring up toward the ceiling as he lay on his back on his bed. His hands were folded neatly over his chest and one ankle rested on top of the other. A small sigh caused his nostrils to flare momentarily. He was in the same bed he'd been sleeping in for weeks but there was something acutely different. He was keenly aware of Stefan's presence in the house; and he was also (to his annoyance) keenly aware of the lack of one Bennett witch. Instead of hearing Bonnie mumble in her sleep he was listening to his brother pace, which he'd been doing every night since Damon had gotten home once he thought Damon was asleep.

Honestly, though, who could sleep with him stomping around like an elephant?

How could he sleep when he'd been living with the same person for months, under the impression things would be this way for the rest of his life? He'd accepted it. This hadn't changed the way the two of them treated each other, but at the same time it had changed everything. Within the span of a day that had been turned upside down and once again his life had been thrown into upheaval. The woman he'd loved before all of this now viewed him as a monster, and the woman he'd spent the last several months with (who'd found a way back against all odds) was two hours away in her college dorm room. He'd gotten so used to her, learned her, from her nervous ticks to all of the buttons he could press to bring out her more colorful language. She'd seemingly gone back to life as usual, so why the hell couldn't he?

He turned over on his side and reached out to grab his phone from the nightstand. It was nearly three in the morning but did college students actually sleep anyway? Not from his previous experience.

He scrolled down his contacts and he didn't have to go far. He didn't have a very long list of A's and Bonnie was one of his few B's. He clicked on her name, opened up a new text and began to type.

_Hey there Judgy. I'm sorry you lost Cuddles again. I can help you look for her if you want._

His finger hovered over the 'send' button before he scoffed at his own message. He quickly erased it and with a roll of his eyes he tossed his phone onto the mattress beside him. What was he, the stuffed animal patrol? Still, it would've been an excuse to get her to visit. She'd been avoiding him ever since they'd gotten back. Maybe she really did hate him as much as she'd told him she did when they'd first gotten stuck together. He wouldn't blame her if she did. He'd done terrible things to her and her friends and family. Unforgivable things. It was best to just let her go. What the hell did he care anyway? He needed to get back into the swing of things, just like she was doing. Business as usual.

And he would. Eventually.

At least that's what he'd tell himself so he could sleep at night.


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note: I realize this chapter is much longer than the first. As I mentioned in the description of the story, the first chapter is actually a small one-shot I wrote which I was encouraged to expand on. This is me expanding. I'm still not entirely sure how I'm going to arrive at where I'm going but I'm taking it as it comes. Hope you enjoy!**

**x**

Bonnie was more than happy to be away from her alone-time with Kai. She'd told him once that she would never enjoy his company, not even a little bit, and her statement had held true. Despite her being rescued from him and the dimension she'd been trapped in, she was experiencing night after sleepless night; and it wasn't for lack of trying. She'd lie there with her eyes closed for what felt like hours at a time, tossing and turning, but never actually falling asleep until a few hours before she'd have to wake up and go to class. It was affecting her mood, her grades, and her day-to-day routine in general.

Tonight she wasn't even attempting sleep. She was simply sitting propped up against her headboard while Caroline and Elena slept soundly in the beds beside her.

She had kept her insomnia a secret to them but she was beginning to find it harder to hide her mood swings and poor performance in classes. They hadn't asked yet though so until they did, she wasn't telling. She just wished she could find the cause of her problem so she could pull it out by the root and fix it. Then again there were several things that could be causing it.

She and Jeremy weren't speaking.

He was angry at her, and she understood why. He had every right to be but that didn't make it hurt any less. Kai was also an issue. His face haunted her every time she closed her eyes. When she did manage to fall asleep at a decent time she would wake up from a nightmare about him, disoriented as to where she was even at. (She'd gotten quite used to waking up in one of the Salvatore mansion's many guest bedrooms.)

Then there was Damon.

She hadn't been subtle about avoiding him lately, though it wasn't as if he was actively trying to contact her either. He was living his life and she was doing her best to go back to hers. She wanted things to go back to the way they were before they'd gotten themselves trapped in another dimension, because the alternative would be a pretty significant change; and she wasn't sure she was ready for that. She sought comfort in the idea of going back to being Jeremy's girlfriend and best friend to Elena and Caroline, and enemy to Damon Salvatore. She didn't want to wake up in the middle of the night and contemplate calling Damon, but that was exactly what had been happening. She rationalized it by telling herself that he was all she'd known for months. It made sense she'd fall back on him, and it did. She just couldn't let it get any deeper than that.

Tonight her mind was even more restless than usual and, on a whim, she quietly crawled out of bed and grabbed her purse. She needed to get away from Whitmore for little while. Christmas break was coming up soon and she'd missed the first half or more of the semester anyway. Maybe she'd just forget about this semester and make up for it during the next one.

Either way, she was going to Mystic Falls for the night (or at least as close to it as she could). She'd let Elena or Caroline know where she went in the morning.

Her music stayed on full blast the whole two hour ride back toward town, and she sang at the top of her lungs, both to keep herself awake and to keep herself occupied. It was creeping toward three in the morning when she rolled up to the cemetery she'd been in when she and Damon were forcibly sucked away from their loved ones as the Other Side fell in on itself. She turned off her car and stepped out into the cold night air where a chill abruptly ran down her spine. She probably should have brought a jacket.

Dead leaves crunched beneath her feet as she walked through the cemetery. She stopped when she arrived at what had been her makeshift 'memorial' when she'd died the first time around. A framed photograph of herself, Matt, Elena, and Jeremy sat there. Another chill went through her, but this one had nothing to do with the weather. A sigh escaped her lips and she saw her breath whirl out into the frosty air and vanish as she leaned down to pick the photo up.

"Bonnie?"

A voice caused her to gasp, the icy air stinging her lungs at such a sharp intake. She stood back up and whirled around, halfway expecting to see Kai standing there. Instead, she saw Jeremy.

Relief flooded through her.

"Jer..." She hesitated before stepping toward him a few paces. "What are you doing out here? It's after-"

"I _know_ what time it is," he interrupted her and shrugged. "I don't know. I couldn't sleep, and I kept thinking about you so..." He held his hands out at his sides as if to say, _here I am_. There was resentment present in his tone and in his eyes.

"I heard your voicemails," she told him as she moved closer still. "I know it isn't worth much but... I'm sorry, for the way things ended. I just.. I didn't want our last days together to be tainted with the fact that I was going away and there was nothing either of us could do about it."

She'd hardly gotten the words out before he cut in, fists clenched and voice raised.

"Things didn't just end, Bonnie. You died. _Again_. You left me here alone and you didn't even have the guts to tell me you were going until you were basically already gone! So, yeah..." He took a moment to catch his breath, compose himself, before he continued. "You're right. 'I'm sorry' doesn't mean much."

Her heart was beating quicker than its regular pace, but mostly it just felt heavy and bruised up. Her stomach had twisted itself into a series of knots that would probably take quite a bit of time to untangle, and tears had begun to prick her eyes; but she was determined not to cry while he was still standing there watching her. She nodded.

"I understand."

He shook his head. She didn't understand, as far as he was concerned. "I just wish _for once_ you'd think about saving yourself before you threw yourself away like you don't even matter." He grew quiet, and she remained silent as well. There was nothing she could say and she knew it. After a long pause, he spoke again. "I still love you... but I can't go back to what we had before." There was another pause, this one shorter. "I can't stand the thought of having you only until the next supernatural disaster strikes and you sacrifice yourself for everyone else."

She didn't say a word, she only nodded, lips firmly pressed together to keep them from quivering.

"I'm, uh.. I'm glad you're back."

It was true. He was glad to see her alive and well, but things had gotten far too torn for him while she was gone. His night was apparently not going to be spent in a cemetery after all. She'd claimed the spot first. He walked away without another word and she didn't try to stop him. She waited for him to go and walked back toward her car when she no longer heard his feet crunching a path through the dry leaves (a sound she'd completely missed as he approached due to her endless stream of thoughts).

Once she was inside her car she barely found the strength to turn it on and get some heat circulating before she broke down in tears.

So much for going back to the way things were.

Tears were coming down in an endless stream and she was openly sobbing when the sound of a hand thudding against her window nearly made her jump out of her skin. "Bennett?" She heard a muffled voice call through the glass. Heart beating so quickly it hurt, she twisted in her seat to look up at her visitor. At this point she wasn't sure if she'd rather be greeted by the sight of Jeremy or Kai.

She saw neither.

Instead she was met with a pair of intensely blue eyes with a shock of dark hair, both of which could only belong to one person.

Damon.


	3. Chapter 3

The second Bonnie registered who her visitor was she quickly averted her gaze from him, furiously wiping at the tears staining her cheeks. There would be no hiding the fact she'd been crying. She'd been caught in the act and she was sure her eyes would be bloodshot and puffy. (She'd never been a very graceful cryer.) No, there was no denying it; but that didn't mean she wanted him to see any more than he already had. She could pretend nothing was wrong even if it was an obvious lie. Hell, she'd been doing it for years now and no one ever seemed to argue her on it, especially not Damon.

Her chest ached with the emotion she was keeping pinned back but she'd get over it. Slowly, she turned back to where his hand was still pressed against the window. He was peering in at her and she was furiously avoiding his gaze.

"Bonnie," he called through the glass. He spoke her first name this time. Was that worry she'd detected in his tone?

Reluctantly, she placed a finger on the button to let the window down and he let his hand fall away from it as the glass slid out of sight. His hands now rested where the glass had been, fingertips inside the car while his palms rested on the metal outside. He bent down at an awkward angle so he could look inside. His eyes scanned the inside of the car, as if he were looking to make sure no one was with her. She cast her gaze down to her lap when his eyes fell back on her; and without warning he reached inside the car and unlocked the door with one hand while he pulled it open with the other.

"Wha-" She let go of the inner handle to avoid getting pulled out of the car as he swung the door open. "What do you think you're doing?" She asked, suddenly feeling more than a little perturbed by his presence.

He looked at her again, eyes narrowing.

"Why the hell have you been avoiding me?"

It wasn't exactly the question he'd meant to ask. He wanted to know why she was upset, but from the moment she'd seen him she'd avoided making eye contact. This only added insult to the injury that was her not returning any of his texts or phone calls.

She glared at him defensively, but she didn't say anything. Honestly she wasn't quite sure why herself. It just seemed easier that way, ignoring the fact their dynamic had changed. Her gaze shifted back down and she gave a simple shrug instead of an actual answer.

A sigh left his lips. At least he'd gotten her to look at him. That was progress, even if she'd fired metaphorical daggers directly into his face.

He reached out and braced himself against the car, putting his weight onto his arm.

"What's wrong with you?"

The Bonnie he'd known didn't sit around and cry when things got tough. She got a bit teary on occasion, sure, but it always ended quickly. She always came out of it with more determination than before. He admired that about her. She was a fighter.

And there it was, the question she'd hoped to avoid. She shook her head, initially planning to just tell him it was nothing. That'd be a waste of breath, she decided. He wasn't going to take that as an answer. That left the problem of whether or not she wanted to fully disclose her drama to him or just keep it to the bare minimum.

She decided on the latter.

"I'm having trouble readjusting," she answered. Her voice was hoarse from crying and she rolled her eyes at the sound of it. Weak. She hated to come across as weak.

He rolled his eyes at the same moment she did, but it had nothing to do with the sound of her voice. Obviously she wasn't in the mood for a sharing session. It was probably better that way, though, if he was being honest. He'd never been that great with others and their emotions.

He pushed away from the car only to walk around to the passenger side so he could sit down.

A smirk tugged at his lips when he heard her sigh as she realized what he was doing. She did _not_ want company, or at least not his. Naturally, that only made him want to stick around longer.

He made himself comfortable in the seat beside him, propping his feet up on the dash and folding his arms over his chest. He let his head lazily loll to the side so he could look at her with a knowing stare.

"You too, huh?"

Three little words and her body language shifted.

Suddenly she was looking at him again, and she wasn't wishing him death through her eyes this time. She had angled herself more toward him, no longer closing him off. Her muscles relaxed and her brows pulled together. She wasn't the only one having issues getting back into a routine? The thought comforted her.

"I've barely been sleeping since we got back," she admitted, her emerald eyes finally fixing themselves onto his blues. She felt the smallest of tugs in her chest. After freezing him out for weeks, she'd missed him more than she realized. "In class I'm either asleep or just...not there. Elena and Caroline love the idea of just starting back where we left off and I've been trying so hard for them but it's not working." Once she'd started talking it was like she just couldn't stop. "I came out here to just be by myself for a little while, but I ran into Jeremy..." She trailed off. The last thing Damon would be interested in would be her love life.

She shrugged, her walls slowly inching back up again.

"I guess _he_ can't go back to the way things were before either," she added, and she left it at that, her gaze falling away from the raven-haired vampire once more.

He had stayed quiet while she spoke. He figured it was the least he owed her after the countless times she'd sat completely silent in their little prison and listened to him go on and on about Elena. She'd listened as if he were some great poet, reciting an epic. Whether it'd been the fact she had no one else to listen to or whether she was just a great listener, he didn't know. Either way, he felt like he owed her. He owed her for that and for sending his lovesick ass home so he could reunite with her best friend while she was stuck, hurt, in a cave with some psycho.

His hands curled into fists at his sides.

"I can always knock him around a little," he offered as a solution to Jeremy. He relaxed, his fists beginning to unclench. "Until he comes to his senses."

He glanced over to see if he'd won a smile. Instead she looked like she might burst into tears again.

"It was a joke," he defended himself a little too harshly and rubbed his palm down over his face.

He was about to offer his condolences about the loss of her significant other (he definitely knew how she felt), but she spoke first.

"I was avoiding you because we never spoke unless we had to. Anytime we were together we were working to do something to keep our friends safe." She paused and glanced over at him to gauge the look on his face. She couldn't read him. "I've been trying so hard to go back to the way things were, and us being friends? That wasn't a thing."

She kept her eyes on him and she swore she saw hurt flash across his features for a millisecond. Her stomach twisted into a knot. When he didn't say anything in return, just stared out into the night through the windshield, she looked away from him.

His first thought had been to fire back at her, ask her who the hell said they were friends; but he didn't. He understood where she was coming from. They'd both been craving the familiar lately, it seemed. He'd been chasing Elena, but he'd also been hoping to hear from Bonnie. It was just as well she'd been avoiding him, really. Had he actually gotten in touch with her he probably would've ended up droning about his girlfriend woes yet again. He'd had enough heart-to-heart for one night, he decided.

"You do know you can't go into Mystic Falls without potentially losing your magic and dying right?" He asked.

She was relieved by the change in subject, and she nodded in reply.

"You got a place to stay?" He and Stefan had taken note from none other than Katherine Pierce and found themselves a foreclosure just outside the town's borders. At least she'd been good for something during her time on earth.

She shook her head. "I was planning on getting a hotel room," she told him.

He took his feet off the dashboard and turned to buckle his seatbelt.

"C'mon then," he nodded. He was ready to get the hell out of the graveyard. "I'll compel you a room way outside of recently-returned-from-the-dead college student budget."

A smile tugged at the corner of her lips, barely there, but he noticed it nonetheless. She revved the car up and shifted gears to get out of the cemetery, but she kept her foot on the brake. She hesitated for a moment before she spoke.

"Thank you," she said, only looking at him after the words had left her mouth. "For listening."

He looked at her, straight-faced, and shrugged. "Don't get used to it," he retorted.

She suppressed a smile of her own, because she knew for a fact he hadn't meant it at all.

"Trust me... I wasn't planning on it," she played along. Her foot edged off of the break and she made her way out of the cemetery and onto the main road; and, thanks to one unexpected Salvatore, she felt exponentially lighter than she had when she'd first arrived.


End file.
